Loneliness is Not a Phase
by Fellowshipper
Summary: Companion piece to "Embers From a Dying Flame." Paige retaliates with her side of the story.


**Title:** Loneliness is Not a Phase

**Notes:** . . . Okay, so maybe I'm just not able to write a single, stand-alone story. I don't know. Anyway, I thought maybe Paige needed a little vindication of her own, so here goes. And yes, I know I tinkered with the actual storyline a bit and made them more of a couple than they actually were, but I claim creative licensing. Also, the title is from an Alice in Chains song I don't recall at the moment. Whoopsy. 

**Disclaimer:** I own very little in this world. Among those things I own, Marvel's characters are not there. Drat. 

******

_You know you only hurt yourself out of spite._

_I guess you'd rather be a martyr tonight. _

_ -- Billy Joel, "Innocent Man"_

I got your letter yesterday. 

Are you really that selfish and that self-absorbed that you think my only goal in life is to hurt you? That anyone's goal in life is to hurt you? Maybe you should take a step back and rethink what you're doing. You have teammates that care about you, and what do you do? You hide away in the basement, convincing yourself they won't like you, telling yourself you don't deserve their company. You have practically every normal girl in this school after you and you tell yourself that you're this horribly disfigured monster that could never have a normal relationship. 

Well, I know that the relationship part was halfway right. You're right, Jono. I didn't know what I was getting myself into when I started going after you. I never once thought I could change you, but I thought that just maybe I could help you see that looks really aren't everything. Not to me, anyway. They are to you. You think everyone you meet is going to be concerned with how you look, but so far, the only one I've seen worried about it is you. I tried to show that to you but you wouldn't listen. I don't know why. Maybe it's some quirk of yours that you have to make yourself feel lowsy to avoid getting committed. 

And then when you slipped up and started getting closer to me than you had to anyone else, you freaked out and started pulling away again. 

It was one of the most painful processes I've ever gone through, you know. To love someone and know they love you back and then it all collapses on you. Slowly. Letting you see the thing caving in and still not being able to do anything about it. I could only hang on and try to salvage what was left, and that didn't work. Obviously. 

It took so long for me to break through that hard shell of yours and start catching glimpses of your true self - deep down, beneath the hate and disgust and angriness at the world, you really are a beautiful person. I never lied when I told you that. Funny, sweet, caring . . . I imagine that's probably something like you were before you let your self-hate consume you. You lash out at anyone that tries to get close to you. Maybe for some reason you feel you deserve to be locked away in that prison you've made for yourself, I don't know. I never claimed to be good at psychology, but even the most careless observer can see what you're doing to yourself. 

You've always been a puzzle to me, even when I first met you. I couldn't understand how someone, not just you, but anyone could actually hate themselves so much that they would willfully punish themselves by keeping away from everyone else, especially over something that wasn't at all their fault. At first I thought you were just antisocial, and I think that's still a part of it, but when I started talking to you and getting to know you I found out that you are one very angry person. 

You've had girl problems in the past, and sometimes I swear I think you hide behind your bitterness and hatred to keep people from seeing how very insecure you are. My theory is that when you were supposedly this uberbabe musician, you got close to many girls who were only there because you were hot and they thought you might actually become a popular rock star, and it devastated you when you found out their motives. Now you can't imagine a girl liking you without doing it based on your looks. It's made you suspicious about getting involved with someone who could very well break your heart again. 

I told you I wouldn't. I'm sorry if I did. 

Somehow, despite the obstacles that laid in our paths, we grew closer to each other and you told me that you had never gotten that close to someone, not even Gayle. It was sort of flattering. I was beginning to think that you had finally gotten it through your stubborn head that someone liked you for you and not who you were once or who they thought you could be. I honestly loved you only for you and you couldn't accept it. You made us self-destruct because you couldn't cope with the idea that someone truthfully cared about you. 

The thing that hurts the most is that I still love you. 

That's what hurts Tristan now, too. Never mind what you and Jubilee and Angelo all think about him, I really do care about him. It's not fair to him that I'm still hung up on you. Try as I might to forget you and what kind of relationship we may have had, I can't. I wish I could. You're right, I'll always remember it. 

But you forgot to mention that you will, too. 

So you can bring up the sex and make yourself think that you were the sacrificial hero of the two of us and make me sound like one of the cheap whores that probably followed you around in London, but you forgot to mention the times when you let down those self-imposed barriers and showed me who you were inside. The brooding wannabe Goth is the Jono I liked. The lesser-known person buried beneath was the Jono I fell in love with. 

You didn't mention how there were times when you would show me what a carefree, silly person you really were. I'm sure no one else here at school knows you have a secret love for the Cartoon Network, especially old Looney Tunes episodes. I bet they don't know that, besides the metal and rock bands, you like classical music. You showed me and told me things that you probably haven't even revealed to Angelo, and he's your best friend. Like I said before, it's sort of flattering in a way. It also just hurts more to think we were so close for a time and then it all fell apart. 

You didn't mention how there were times when everything - school, being a mutant, the entire world, even - would get too much to bear alone and you'd break down in my arms and cry, sometimes for hours on end, and I never turned you away. I was always there for you. Maybe that's all I was to you, just a shoulder to cry on and something to fuel your sick desire to be the despised creature you thought you were. 

And maybe it's a dumb thing to say, but if I went back in time knowing we'd end up this way, I don't think I'd change a thing. 

I was raised to believe in predestination. I don't believe in it now, but some of it still lingers a bit. I figure that's why I'm big on fate and destiny and all that. I honestly think we were brought together for a reason, just maybe we weren't meant to stay together. Maybe it was to show me that I really can't have everything I want, to show you that people don't live only to target and hurt you. 

Conceited though it may sound, I really do think I helped you, at least a little, anyway. When we were alone and far away from anyone else, you showed me a side of you that was so goofy and lovable that someone couldn't help but adore you. I like to think that I brought that side out of you. I know it doesn't mean much to you now, but I think it was good for you that you were able to live that way, even for just a little while. You'd been keeping that mask so long you were forgetting what it was hiding. 

And even after all that, you still think I set out just to hurt you. 

I know a great deal of that is understandably because you're upset at our already unstable relationship crumbling, but a part of me wonders if you really believe that's all I ever wanted to do. If you do, then you're more of a fool than I ever would have thought. If you couldn't see how much I loved you then you were just as blind as you were foolish, too. 

I still remember the night I broke up with you. You were hiding in that cave you call a room, and I could tell by the look you had when I walked in you knew what was about to happen. So, you stalled. Tried to delay it. Started asking about homework and T.V. and anything you could think of to keep me from getting to the point. Eventually, I did. When I told you that I didn't think it was fair to tie you down because I had too many commitments as it was, I wasn't lying. I meant every word of it. I didn't think you'd appreciate only a half-hearted relationship when I couldn't give you everything I had. I still remember the way you tried to act like it didn't bother you, like you knew it'd been coming, but you were shaking and you had tears in your eyes. You had really started believing we could make it work and then I messed it up. 

"I'm sorry I couldn't live up to your expectations," you told me, and there wasn't any bitterness or accusations in your words, just a sad matter-of-fact tone. You somehow took my story and turned it personal, as if I'd been looking for an excuse to get out of dating you. That was never the case. 

"But you did," I told you, "and exceeded them, actually. That's what makes it even harder to let go." 

Then everything went crazy. 

I cried myself to sleep that night. Cried so much Jubilee told me I kept her up half the night with hiccups. Remember that stupid pink frog you bought me as an out of the blue, "I felt like it" gift? I held that thing and cried into it until its fur was matted down. Not even two days later, Tristan decided to blackmail me into going out with him, and truth be told, I didn't want to. Not at first. But as it went on, I realized that just maybe he wasn't such a bad guy after all. Not perfect, of course, but he wasn't the evil monster everyone tried to make him out to be. He was nice and sort of funny, like you were at times, but I loved the fact he didn't try to make me feel guilty for liking him. You did. I liked you and tried to get you to like yourself, and all you did was turn it around on me and try to make me feel guilty for it. 

I kept going out with him because he let me like him. That's all I ever wanted from you. I didn't want you to be something you weren't or something you may have been at one time. I wanted to love you with all my heart but you wouldn't let me, and all my trying couldn't make you let me. 

I'm sorry that you can't like yourself enough to let someone else do the same. Someday you will, I'm sure. I know you will. As frail as your ego may be, you're stronger than you think you are, probably stronger than any of us thinks you are. You'll get better and you'll love again. You'll let someone else love you. 

I just wish you'd let it be me. 


End file.
